Haunting Memories
by Kuramastrass
Summary: Past and present intertwine as the memories return to haunt me... The names, the faces, the words... Things were different in the past... Should I choose my own destiny now, make my own choice? Should I tell her that I am the one she's been searching for?


**Hey, everyone. I wrote this a long time ago, took it down, and did some work on it. So here it is, in its finished, edited form!**

**I don't own YuYu Hakusho. Nope. Never.**

**This is based off of episode… I forget the number now… Darn… Anyway, I believe the episode is called… Shoot, now I forget that too… It was... "Haunted by the Past"! Yay! I actually remembered!**

**Yeah. Anyway, I did some work with this. Not a ton, because it was really pretty good to start with. Yeah.**

**So, here's my Haunting Memories! And… you know… review? Please?**

So many memories... The ghosts of my past, they haunt me even as I sleep...

_"This imiko.. this... boy of fire... will destroy us all."_

Maybe the old fool was right. Seeing what I have become, maybe she was right to try to kill me.

_"My baby! Please, give him back to me!"_

Those are the words that always strike me most... The words of my mother... Her piercing shriek breaking the silence of the falling snow...

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

Walking through that frozen forest... It was bitter cold, an endless sea of white. I would prefer perpetual darkness to the endless white, the fires of Hell to this freezing cold...

But then, where is Hell? There is no Hell waiting for me; I went through Hell while I was alive.

I'm still there.

I arrived at the village, to see every one of them draw themselves inside as I approached. They did not seem to recognize me as the boy they left for dead.

Their hearts frozen so thoroughly after so many centuries... there is no thawing for them. They would melt completely, with the ice.

As they drew away from me, I saw that despite their frozen hearts they were still capable of emotion. Fear filled their eyes, though not because they knew or cared who I was. I was different. I was not one of them. I was something to be feared.

I merely smirked at them, to hide the pain of loneliness I felt once again. They all left me, alone, from the ones who had been alive when I was born, to the young children, who seemed to still have hearts that were open and beat, but their mothers ushered them away.

Through the empty and abandoned streets I walked, the scene repeating itself in my head, my mother's words ringing in my ears...

_"My baby! Please, give him back to me!"_

_"This imiko... this... boy of fire... will destroy us all."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

I found myself outside the village, a distance from it.

"Rui, take care of the village while I'm gone."

"I will."

Rui, my mother's supposed friend, the one who dropped me over the edge and left me for dead, and that hag who had forced her to do it. Once she had gone, I showed myself to Rui. She drew back.

I smirked. To think that her heart may have thawed...

"Don't worry, I'm not here to hurt you. I want to find out about a woman I once knew..."

Rui shot me a disbelieving glance as I uttered my mother's name. Eventually she nodded, and led me where I needed to be.

She brought me to a graveyard.

"She died of heartbreak years after the death of one of her children."

"What about... the other one?" I found myself asking. I was curious about the fate that had befallen my younger twin sister... Was the child that had caused her death me, or...?

Rui's face became softer as she thought. "She was the sweetest, most gentle child any of us had ever seen."

The edges of her eyes began sparkling with tears as she continued. She seemed to have taken the girl in as her own, and genuinely cared for her. So her heart _had_ begun to thaw...

"A few years ago, she disappeared quite suddenly, without a word. She was so quiet, none of us expected it..." Her voice trailed off.

I turned to leave. I had found out what I had initially wanted to know, but now I had something more important to do.

"Wait, where're you going?" she asked me. I continued walking. "You're the one, aren't you? You're _him_." She ran after me, tripping and falling in the fresh, wet snow. "I'm so sorry... for what I've done to you..." she sobbed. "Please forgive me..."

- -

_"This imiko... this... boy of fire... will destroy us all." _

_"My baby!"_

_"I'm sorry." _

_"Do not pity the beast."_

_"Please, give him back to me!" _

_"When you return, please kill me first."_

_"Rui! Don't!"_

_"I know this is hard for you, but you must do it for her own good."_

_"It's the least I can offer for what I'm about to do..." _

_"He will slaughter us all! Do it to save our village..."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

_"Did you hear? Hina gave birth to twins! And one of them's a boy!"_

_"Please, I'll leave the village and never come back. Just let my son live!"_

It is never the actions that haunt me... But only the words...

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

_"If you find someone with a stone like that, would you please give it to him and tell him his sister's looking for him in the Human World?"_

Yukina...

- -

Despite that I was only days old, I could hear every word they were saying.

_"Did you hear...?"_

_"He will slaughter us all."_

_"My baby!"_

_"I'm sorry."_

_"I will leave the village and never come back!"_

_"Do not pity the beast."_

_"Please, give him back to me!"_

_"It's the least I can offer..."_

_"No!"_

_"Do it for her own good."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

As I fell, I willed myself to live, even if only to see that I would return and melt their hearts of ice.

- -

_"This imiko... this... boy of fire... will slaughter us all."_

_"Even when he was very young, my brother was surrounded by intense flames."_

_"When you return, please kill me first."_

_"They had to wrap him in a sacred cloth."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

"If the flames surrounding him then were that strong, then it should be no problem for your Jagan eye to detect him." She smiled, the prospect of being reunited with her brother filling her with joy.

"How do you know your brother's still alive?" My own words sounded empty to me, hollow...

Her smile faded.

- -

After my fall from my homeland, I was discovered by a group of bandits. They took me in, giving me a home and family. They taught me to fight, to kill, to steal.

- -

_"We Ice Maidens are granted a child by miraculous means every 100 years. And when that happens, the mother cries a single tear, more precious than all the others, which is given to the child."_

_"I know he's alive. He will return."_

_"But, when my mother gave birth to twins... she cried two tears."_

- -

Finding the island on which I was born... that was the sole purpose of my life.

_"You killed my son!"_

I would take revenge on them for what they had done to me...

_"When you return, please kill me first."_

But when I returned, finding that my mother was dead and my sister had gone to look for me... I lost my desire to kill them.

_"They don't deserve to live. That's... how I feel."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

The Makai had been thrown into chaos with the coming death of Raizen. The Detective, having turned out to be Raizen's son, joined what was left of their troops. Kurama had been called by Yomi...

And I by Mukuro.

"If you find someone with a stone like that, would you please give it to him and tell him his sister's looking for him in the Human World?"

The Fox and the Detective had already gone. Of the three who were going, I was the only one left.

I turned the jewel over in my hand. It was captivating, as my own had been. I looked back up at her.

- -

Bound by my word to Shigure, I could not reveal my identity to her.

I had never planned to. As long as I could watch over her and know she was safe, I would be satisfied.

_"On the condition that he must never reveal his identity to her. But I will revoke my fee this one time... if you can kill me."_

That was years ago... since Shigure had killed himself, and I lost my battle to Mukuro, many more Makai tournaments had come and passed...

Did I still not want her to know?

- -

I found myself staring into my mother's stone for hours, and when I would, a strange calm would overtake me. I lost my lust to kill, and I began to wonder if finding the village of my birth was that important.

_"You killed my son!"_

The ghosts of my past... haunt me in my sleep. Always those same words...

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

I never realized how important it was to me... until I lost it.

For years, having found that my mother's frozen teardrop was so valuable, I wore it openly around my neck. I hoped the greed of anyone who saw it would entice them to challenge me.

They grew tired of my killing habits. I found myself shunned and alone once again...

I never realized how important it was to me... until I lost it.

Demons, filled with greed, were always trying to take my stone.

Most days, I did nothing more than plan my next kill.

One day, one of them succeeded.

I never realized how important it was to me... until I lost it.

- -

_"You killed my son!"_

"That dream... again..." I muttered on awakening, blinking several times to adjust my eyes to the light.

"Hiei."

I looked up to Mukuro, who had called my name.

That dream again...

_"You killed my son!"_

_"This imiko... this... boy of fire... will destroy us all."_

_"I'm sorry."_

_"Do not pity the beast."_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

"Hiei, I will grant you a place of honor on my elite guard... if you can defeat this man."

"Feh. I don't need your honor."

"Oh, I think you will accept my offer. I will return shortly with your challenger."

Fool. Did I not just say that I do not want your honor?

It was all I could do but think of that time... That dream had haunted me for the past months...

My first real conversation with Mukuro...

- -

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

She merely looked at me now, wondering what I could have been dreaming.

Too tired to even utter "Hn", I closed my eyes and moved my head ever so slightly. Then I stood to leave.

"Where're you going?"

"Out."

I did not think about where I was going... I merely went.

- -

_"I wasn't giving it to you!"_

_"Chill, Hiei, it was a joke."_

Kurama...

_"You want me to give this to Yukina, right?"_

_"Yes! I want her to call off this ridiculous search for me."_

- -

_"What makes you think your brother's still alive?"_

- -

After being left by the bandits that had raised me, and the loss of my mother's precious stone, I went in search of Shigure, who I was told could give me a Jagan implant.

- -

I found myself in... that place...

One stone hung around my neck. The other I held in my hand. Without a word, I tossed it to him, and he caught it effortlessly.

He stared at it for a moment, turning it over in his hand, as I had when she had first given it to me, and then he spoke.

"I'm sorry, but I cannot accept this." He paused.

I took advantage of the silence to glance up at him, my eyes boring into his own emerald ones, asking him what he meant with them.

"As much as I appreciate our friendship and everything we've been through..." He paused again, though continued right away. "I don't feel for you that way."

It took me a moment to fully realize what he had said. Angry and disturbed, I blurted out, "I wasn't giving it to you!"

He chuckled, pleased to see that his light remark had ruffled me so. "Chill, Hiei, it was a joke."

I didn't respond, except to glare at him maliciously. The silence lay between us, awkward.

He broke it, speaking again. "You want me to give this to Yukina, right?" he asked more gently.

"Yes!" I was still flustered, but before I spoke again, I had regained myself. "I want her to call off this ridiculous search for me."

Is that still what I really wanted?

- -

_"You killed my son!"_

No matter where I went... or where I go...

_"You killed my son!"_

The voices follow me... They haunt me...

_"You killed my son!"_

_"This imiko... this... boy of fire..."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"I'm sorry."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"Did you hear?"_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"When you return, please kill me first."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"Chill, Hiei, it was a joke."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"Do not pity the beast."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"It's the least I can offer..."_

_"You killed my son!"_

_"If you see someone with a stone like that..."_

_"I will leave the village and never come back. Just let my son live!"_

_"How do you know your brother's still alive?"_

_"You killed my son!"_

- -

Yes, it was that same clearing... where I had had my last real meeting with Kurama.

The white flashed in front of my eyes, and the bitter wind blew past me.

I pulled out my stone and stared at it, the calm overcoming me. All I wanted was to continue staring at it...

And to see my sister.

- -

_"It's something Miss Rui told me."_

_"Please forgive me..."_

_"I believe he's alive."_

- -

"Quit looking for a phantom twin brother who for all you know is dead," I told her. "If you want someone dead, do it yourself."

Her smile faded, her gaze downcast. Then she lifted her head back up, smiling again.

"I think that's the kind of advice a girl might get... from her brother."

- -

"What is this?" he asked me, eyeing the videotape nervously, as though, merely because I held it, it was something dangerous and might explode.

"It's from Koenma." I walked away, leaving the Detective to his job.

Then I found out what his mission was. They had purposely given me the videotape and not told me what it contained.

By the time I got there, Toguro seemed to have been taken care of by the Detective and the idiot.

"Who are you?"

Bound by my word to Shigure, I could not reveal who I was.

"Oh... just a friend of theirs."

- -

_"I believe he's alive."_

- -

Then I remembered... before I first met Yukina, before I cared... The plan... it was...

I narrowed my eyes in focus.

It had been quite a few years ago, a little more than a century now... the plan...

- -

Alongside Gouki and Kurama, the expert thief, I broke into Reikai's vault.

I could not imagine what he was planning or why he was coming along, as we had met only once before, and I had been told that he was a _reformed_ thief...

Having made off with the three dark artifacts... We stopped in a forest, going over the plan.

The plan...

We stopped in a Human World forest... in a clearing... not unlike this one. And that was when...

"Who are you?"

"Yusuke Urameshi, official supernatural detective!"

"So, a bounty hunter."

I first met the Detective.

"If you are trouble, it'll keep!" I closed my eyes, smirking at the memory of my words. I was right. The Detective was always causing trouble...

Gouki had been the first of us three to fall by the Detective's hand. So he had recovered the Orb of Baast, the first of the three dark artifacts...

It set a precedent for what he would accomplish on his missions to come. The Detective had lost the fight the first time, and barely healed, he came back to fight again.

And won.

Kurama was the next to lose the stolen artifact of his choice... though it was because he was soft.

But, as I have come to realize, that is not his weakness... but his strength.

He would sacrifice anything for the sake of his human mother, even his own life. As I found out, he had agreed to help steal the dark artifacts for that reason... to save his human mother's life at the cost of his own.

Never is he more dangerous than when the lives of his human family are being threatened...

_"This holds back what I was... But that doesn't mean I can't be worse!"_

The Detective, feeling that the Fox's cause was noble and just, offered some of his own life energy to the mirror to keep the Fox alive.

- -

Ever since joining forces with the Detective and Reikai... I have seen him progress from nothing more than a human with bad enough luck to be stuck working for Reikai to the demon son of Raizen he is today.

And not much about him has changed since that first day we met.

_"Yusuke Urameshi, official supernatural detective!"_

Yes, the fool is still as arrogant and stubborn as he had been that day.

- -

Why...? Why were all of these memories flooding to me...? I had thought most of them to be buried and forgotten...

I turned my head sharply, upward and to the right. Had I heard someone moving in the leaves of the trees? Or was it only another memory...?

_"Why is someone as good as you working for Eight-Hands?"_

_"Eight-Hands is in town?"_

Yes... It was when I first met Kurama, during a stop on my search for Yukina...

- -

I left in search of a place that would lead me to Human World near either Kurama or the Detective. The Detective had promised all those years ago to his woman that he would return to her...

Another memory came to me, this of my first fight with the Detective.

"Every time he escapes my Jagan eye... every time he escapes danger... his strength increases! I have to end this now..."

I ran forward, to kill him by thrusting the Sword of Darkness into his chest, to pierce his heart.

But then...

"Kurama?"

And he cut himself on the sword now in his stomach, to blind my Jagan with his blood...

"Ah... My Jagan..."

- -

Despite that I knew that he wanted to stay, the Detective had left the Makai, keeping his promise to her.

But he does come back much too often for his own good.

"I know this is hard for you, but you must do it for her own good."

It's strange... Strange how words used in one situation can apply so perfectly to another, completely different situation...

- -

Using the abilities of my Jagan, I found a place that would take me to Human World near Genkai's temple. Yukina had taken residence there, having no attachments to the Makai. She felt that our people didn't deserve to live, because of what they had done to her brother she did not know, to me.

_"They don't deserve to live. That's... how I feel."_

She had no desire to return to the place of our birth, and this was the only place she had to stay.

I landed on the grass in the courtyard of the temple silently. No one inside stirred. I smirked, not having expected anyone to notice my arrival. I opened the door, letting myself in.

The old woman glanced up at the opening door, her gaze turning from the television to me, her customary cup of tea in her hands. Taking a long sip, she acknowledged my presence, and when she had finished her drink, she merely asked me, "What do you want?"

"No business of yours," I answered curtly. "I merely wished to see Yukina."

Her head appeared around the corner then, as though my words had special qualities.

"Good morning, Genkai," she said cheerily. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to make you breakfast this morning." She took notice of me. "Hello, Mr. Hiei," she greeted me, smiling.

"Yukina." I nodded in greeting. After only seconds of silence, I found myself saying, "I have something for you."

Her eyes brightened, although she had no idea what it was that I meant to give her. "Thank you," she said softly.

I turned to go back into the courtyard and she followed me. The old woman inside returned her attention to the television. Once having arrived in the courtyard, Yukina shut the door behind her.

I held out her stone to her.

She stared at it for a moment, as though she had forgotten what it was. Then, recognizing it, she murmured another "thank you". She took it from me, playing with it in her hands, and then glanced up at me. "My brother... is...?"

I knew what she would ask. Was this the stone she had given to me? Was her brother still alive?

As an answer, I reached for my own matching necklace and brought it into her sight. I nodded. "That is yours."

Whoever knew that that one small trinket could bring one person such joy? She took her own necklace then, placing it around her neck. It was now where it was meant to be: with the child for whom it was shed. Her ruby-red eyes met my own, and I couldn't help but feel joy myself, seeing how bright her smile was. She was almost bursting with joy, though why, I cannot say.

Perhaps she had forgotten how long she had known me, forgotten how long I had been under her nose and not told her.

"Please, will you stay here with us?" she asked me. "Only Kazuma and Keiko come to visit, and it's been less and less often." Her smile fading, gaze downcast, she looked as she did when she had given me her necklace with our mother's frozen teardrop, when I had asked her how she knew her brother was still alive. Her mood brightened quickly, the thought of my staying here bringing her pleasure.

"I... cannot," I answered her, regretting that I could not lie to her. I wouldn't lie to her, not anymore.

She looked at me, her eyes full of sadness and hurt. I knew, her next question would be...

"Why?" It was almost silent, but it was filled the most emotion I had ever heard in a single word.

I could not think of a good enough answer for her at that moment, and I still haven't. I had a life in the Makai, and as much as I would love to stay with her, I could not bring myself to... But I had a feeling she would not be satisfied with that reply. She would ask me, surely I had a life here, in Human World, as well?

"I simply... cannot."

"Oh," she answered me softly, her glance directed at the ground. Her eyes filled to the brim with sadness, hurt, confusion... Was it possible to have that much of those emotions within you? "I just thought..."

I never answered her; I merely left, not being able to think of the right way to word what I wanted to say to her.

And for the rest of my life, not only did the words haunt me... But her eyes also haunted me...

The ghosts of my past... and the look in her eyes… when I told her I could not stay...

- Kuramastrass -


End file.
